Megachurches “are poor places for formation and pastoral care” and tend toward “addictive dependence” on their founders.
These were the words of Tim Keller in a recent Facebook post, explaining why the megachurch he founded — Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City — decided to split into three congregations when he retired in 2017.
Keller planted Redeemer back in 1989 with just 50 people, but by 2008, the church had grown to a total weekly attendance of more than 5,000. Yet, remarkably, the former megachurch pastor has come out this week and said that Christians would benefit more from 10 churches of 400 scattered throughout the city rather than one church of 4,000 in the middle of it.
According to Keller, smaller churches are more effective.
Why mega-churches don’t work
Keller’s insightful post highlighted several issues with the culture of megachurches. Here are some of his observations, along with my own thoughts:
Too big to care for people
Let’s start with the obvious. When you are in a congregation of thousands of people, it is possible to attend that church for many years without even being noticed — let alone known by anyone.
In my early twenties, I attended a megachurch for about 18 months. When I moved on, no one noticed that I had left. I bumped into someone who still attended that church sometime later. “Haven’t seen you at church for a while,” they said. “I left about two years ago,” I said. “Oh… I’m sorry,” They blushed.
Sure, you might get receive a cursory and obligatory greeting from an usher at the church door and an awkward hello from the people sitting around you during the token “greeting time” during the service, but if you really want to be known in a megachurch, it’s up to you to make yourself known.
Time Keller says that this is one of the design deficits of megachurches. “In general, they are poor places for formation and pastoral care due to their size.” However, your absence will be noticed in a smaller church, and you are more likely to receive meaningful pastoral care.
Too dependent on the founder
The script that most megachurches follow is a fairly predictable one. A megachurch is usually founded by a high-capacity, visionary, charismatic leader who is often a gifted communicator. He is able to paint a picture of a desirable future and knows how to get people on board with that vision.
Megachurches tend to grow quickly under their founding pastor. However, warns Keller, they often end up depending too much on the gifts and personality of that founder. An unhealthy codependence forms between the church and its pastor.
All too often, the end of the story involves some sort of moral failing or emotional burnout on the part of the pastor that results in a complete and total spiritual trainwreck. If an entire church is built on the back of one charismatic leader, the church either goes into sharp decline or ceases to exist altogether when he falls.
We see it over and over again. Think Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill, Bill Hybels, and Willow Creek, and, most recently, Brian Houston and Hillsong Church.
Too much attachment on the part of the leader
Not only does the church become too reliant on its founding pastor — treating him as a kind of celebrity — the founder can also become unhealthily attached to the church.
Tim Keller observes that the founder can come to see the church as their personal possession and an extension of their personality and self-image. They often never want to leave, nor do they know how to leave well. It is good to leave sooner rather than later as a spiritual discipline.
I have worked in a church where the lead pastor had been there for four decades. He wore that as a badge of honor, but the truth was that he had overstayed his tenure by about twenty years, and the church was stagnating as a result. What is worse, his ministry became more about preserving his ministry than anything else. Anyone who suggested to him that it might be time to move on found themselves frozen out — their conduct and character assassinated.
Like many church pastors, he started with a good heart, but his ego took over, and his identity became subsumed into the very fabric of the church. If he lost the church, he would lose his identity as well.
Too much pressure on the successor
When the founder finally does leave — either by accident or design — the successor is left in the shadow of the enormous personality of the original leader.
It is a poisoned chalice. Keller observes that the successor is always excessively and sometimes harshly compared in every way to the founder. It’s a lose-lose for them and the church. Moreover, because megachurches are grown large under their founder’s vision and personality, they are not usually sustained by being given to one successor.
This was a large part of the reason that Tim Keller chose not to hand over his megachurch to one pastor when he retired. Rather, the church formed three congregations with three different pastors. Redeemer has since grown two more congregations and added two more pastors for a total of five.
Too few opportunities for ordinary people
The bigger a church, the more likely the key functions of the church are covered by a paid professional. The megachurch may talk about “the priesthood of all believers.” But it’s all rhetoric. In reality, the work of the megachurch is carried out by a select few while the rest sit back and consume.
However, smaller congregations must make use of a greater percentage of lay persons’ gifts and talents, so there is less dependence on staff, and there is a smaller number of onlookers who only attend to observe and not participate.
Too large a catchment for care for local communities
I remember the day that Hillsong Church started in my city. I was running a local youth group in the outer suburbs. Within a few weeks, Hillsong Church was sending buses twenty, even thirty kilometers away to bring teenagers in from all over the city.
We couldn’t compete with the bright lights, rock music, and smoke machines of Hillsong Church. Local churches were cannibalized by Hillsong, while Hillsong was patting itself on the back for bringing revival to the city. Of course, most of it was transfer growth from the local church to the megachurch. The result of that phenomenon is a disconnect between the Christian and their local community.
Tim Keller says, “Megachurches tend to draw people from great distances who then are not geographically close enough to take part in community building, discipleship, and local ministry to the neighborhood of the church. It is harder for them to be other-focused in the local area.”
So, what makes a good-sized church?
There is no exact answer to this question. However, there are definitely some key functions that the church ought to be able to carry out, regardless of its size. Here are a few guidelines that I think can help us decide if a church is too large.
- A church ought to be small enough for all people to be known, and their absence felt if they happen not to be there.
- A church ought to be small enough to provide personal pastoral care and growth opportunities for its members.
- A church ought to be large enough to meet its financial obligations with plenty to spare for giving. Different models of church are less expensive than others. Churches with high costs risk insolvency should things take a turn for the worse.
- A church ought to never be reliant on one person’s gifts, talents, charisma, or personality. This is a one-way ticket to disaster.
- A church ought to be small enough to feel a strong sense of connection to its local community. If every church took responsibility for caring for one city block, it would be more effective than one church trying to care for an entire metropolis.
- A church ought to be small enough for people to have opportunities to serve, help and participate in meaningful ways — not merely consume.
As for me, my church these days consists of a handful of people gathering around an open fire in my backyard, with a beer in one hand and a Bible in the other. It costs nothing to run. There is no stage, no pulpit, and no rock band. There is no personality cult connected to a charismatic leader. It’s reproducible, relocatable, and relatable.
I’m not saying it’s a better way, but it sure works for me.
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This post was previously published on Backyard Church.
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